The name of the several countries called Guinea means Land
of the Blacks from a Berber word.

There were Susu kingdoms of the Mandingo people in the interior
from 900 AD and at the coast from 13th cent. The Portuguese came
in the 15th century and started the slave trade. Thus the culture
of the area has influenced the Americas and the Caribbean.

In the 16th century there was a Fulani empire in the Fouta
Djallon Mountains which was at its peak from 1725 to the early
19th century.

The French made the coastal area a protectorate in 1849. It
became the Colony of French Guinea from 1895.

The territory became independent suddenly in 1958. President
Charles de Gaulle had called a referendum reconstituting the
French Empire as the French Union, giving each territory a degree
of autonomy under overall French control. The independence campaigner
Sekou Touré advised people to vote NO. The French left
at once allegedly taking even the typewriters and light bulbs.

Toure ran a one-party tyranny in which many thousands of the
population fled outside the borders of the country. There was
a war with Guiné Bissau in 1980 over the rights to the
sea coast in which oil was suspected to be located (none was
found). Sekou Touré died in 1984. The regime then relaxed
when the succeeding military regime dismantled the doctrinaire
socialist structures of a one-party state.

Formerly a notorious one-party state under Sekou Touré
from which hundreds of thousands fled. Now a military regime,
believed to be less brutal. The ruler, Lansana Conte, is reported
to be ill with Leukemia and there are calls for him to resign.
He came to power in a military coup that overthrew Sekou Touré.

Lansana Conte, the military leader who overthrew Touré,
has himself become unpopular, and in 2007, seems to be on the
way out. There have been demonstrations in the street against
him.

If he is overthrown, will the state continue, or decline into
a failed state?
He declared a state of emergency and Martial Law (2007).
He died on 22 December 2008. The military then took over.

Interesting reading

Camara Laye - The African Childabout the traditional apprenticehip
of the blacksmith and the passing on of wisdomCamara
Laye - The Radiance of the KingA mystical tale of a journey

The modern economy was crippled by the policies of the Sekou
Toure regime and by isolation from the rest of the world's reluctance
to trade. Bauxite and hydroelectricity could produce an income
but the Conte regime neglected the economy.